Both Senate and House Republican balanced Budget proposals Increase Taxes on Families and Businesses, Despite the Denials.

Funny thing about Republicans, they're crazy deficit exploding tax cuts and increases have never gotten much notice before, until now. They're in charge of congress, so now the truth is coming out....

AP: FACT CHECK: Higher taxes to balance GOP budgets: The new House and Senate Republican budgets make a big boast: They both balance the federal budget within 10 years, without raising taxes. Their own numbers, however, say millions of American families and businesses would have to pay more in taxes to make the math work — about $900 billion more over the next decade.

Both budgets also claim big savings by repealing President Barack Obama's health law. But at the same time, they rely on more than $1 trillion in tax revenue from the health law that would supposedly be repealed.

So how do they explain keeping the ObamaCare tax revenue? Why they're going to...change...the tax code...yea, that's the ticket:

The House Republican budget repeals all of Obamacare — including the Obamacare tax hikes while calling for fundamental tax reform. A revamped tax code could raise just as much revenue as the system in place today, but without the harmful tax policies embedded in current law (like the Affordable Care Act)."

Ryan's Fake Deficit Reduction Plan filled with Failed GOP Policies.

Balanced budget amendments were a very big thing for Republicans awhile back. And it never really took off for obvious reasons; it’s often described as a strait jacket that affects all future legislatures and congresses. It presumes that future politicians won’t be able to come up with a better way to balance a budget.

Paul Ryan’s quest to control the universe and make it into an devastated landscape of Ayn Randian dysfunction is contained in his new/old reworking past failures. Remember, none of this would be happening if Republicans hadn't spent like drunken sailors with a charge card. Surprise, now we have a "crisis." USA Today:

- A balanced budget achieved in a decade by not allowing the government to spend more than it collects in revenue … 19.1% of gross domestic product … the federal government will spend $4.6 trillion less over the next decade.

- Authorizes construction of the Keystone XL pipeline.

Ryan’s “patient centered” vision for health care, centers on individuals by telling them, “you’re on your own” see ya later. No group discounts, no mandated basic coverage, just individual policies spelled out in confusing legalese that pretty much exempts everything.

- A full repeal of Obama's health care law.

Big government Republicans like Ryan like to pick winners and losers even in a “free market” environment. Nothing does that more than tort reform schemes that make people the losers. It’s another Ryan gift to insurers:

- Support for new laws to limit medical malpractice liabilities.

Medicare would be like any other insurance health care plan, that would take a retirees money in the form of co-pays at a much lower income level (skin in the game). Under the guise that only wealthy seniors will pay more, you’d have to ask, what’s “wealthy?” The co-pays will then discourage seniors from seeing a doctor, the current problem we have today and one of the reasons why health care costs so much. Yes, Ryan is throwing another bone to insurers.

- A fundamental overhaul of the Medicare system for future retirees. Starting in 2024, seniors would be given a federal subsidy to purchase health care from the private market, instead of the guaranteed benefit system that currently exists. It also calls for wealthy seniors to pay more for premiums.

Ryan wants states to have complete control over Medicaid and other funds so even the most impoverished family will have to make monthly premiums to private insurers and be required to work for peanuts just to get food stamps:

- A transfer of power to states to determine how Medicaid and other funds should be spent on programs, including food stamps.

Despite spending more on our military than the world biggest countries combined, Ryan wants to spend more. Little known fact; the military has lost over $2 trillion.   

- An increase in defense spending over current law.

Here's a brief description of pentagon waste I'll be dealing more with in another post:

CBS: On Sept. 10, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld declared war. Not on foreign terrorists, "the adversary's closer to home. It's the Pentagon bureaucracy," he said. "According to some estimates we cannot track $2.3 trillion in transactions," Rumsfeld admitted.

So let's spend more? But Ryan doesn't care. And when it comes to the tax code and Soc. Sec.:

- A plan to transform the tax code to simplify it from seven individual tax brackets to two, as well as a repeal of the Alternative Minimum Tax and a 25% corporate tax rate.

- A requirement that the president and Congress offer respective proposals for the long-term solvency of Social Security.

How Does Paul Ryan Get Away with This?

Even when a thoughtful, what appears to be a smart conservative, wants to hear just a few details of the Romney/Ryan plan to balance the budget, Paul Ryan still doesn't have the time break the message down to a simple sound bite with one or two examples.

Republican voters just don't seem to care, except for maybe this one audience member:

Walker/Fitzgerald Brothers didn't balance the budget after all. What they didn't tell you; massive cuts to come.

Cognitive Dissidence brought to my attention this amazing fact about Walker’s much touted “balance budget,” via Politifact (they do great research only).  

In 2010, when he ran to succeed Doyle, Walker made an explicit promise, on his campaign website: To "require the use of generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) to balance every state budget, just as we require every local government and school district to do." We examined Walker's first budget, the 2011-13 biennial budget, to see if he lived up to his promise to balance the budget using GAAP.

There's a chart every two years in the state budget demonstrating the bottom line under GAAP. The chart in the Walker administration’s Budget in Brief shows that the 2011-13 budget was not close to balanced by that standard. In fact, the state would have been left with a deficit of $3 billion by 2012-13 under Walker's budget. That compares to the $2.9 billion GAAP deficit he inherited at the end of Doyle's term, the state's financial statements show.

Walker"s critics didn't highlight those numbers -- it was not in their interest to call for even more cuts in the state budget.

But they will call for more cuts, which will continue the long fast slide into third world status. Frankly, I’m not sure how even fanatical Walker supporters will like the cuts to come.

But like Sen. Alberta Darling promised a reporter after being asked what would happen if the budget cuts didn’t work; it's not that the ideology of tax cuts failed, it's the need for more spending cuts.  

I emailed my unflinchingly conservative friend this story, and here's his typical inflexible answer:

"So, what's your point we are still in a better position as far as revenue is concerned. I'd sure like to see the cuts after the smoke clears." 

Walker balanced budget by cutting Sexual Assault Victim Services grant. It's Working.

It’s working…again?

Tough budget decisions have benefited big business in Wisconsin, resulting in …nothing much at all but job losses. But the most needy, like sexual assault victims, have been abandoned. This is what conservative voters and the Walker administration thinks is working.

Channel3000: The Wisconsin Justice Department plans to dramatically cut funding for organizations that help sexual assault victims. DOJ provides grants to victim service providers through its Sexual Assault Victim Services program. Agency officials warned providers in November that they plan to cut the grants by 42.5 percent … had to make the cuts because the state budget has imposed a 10 percent cut to all state agencies and another $174.3 million in cuts on top of that.

The Wisconsin Coalition Against Sexual Assault is calling the cuts disastrous. DOJ officials said they are aware of the challenges the cuts present but they have little choice.

Walker and the DOJ made sure we knew they were tough on sex crimes. Just don't bring up the victims.